Bears plan to defend Academic Decathlon championship

Merced County decathletes will test their knowledge of India during the 35th Academic Decathlon on Saturday, and the school to beat is Merced High School – which has upheld its title as champion for seven straight years.

The Academic Decathlon pits high school teams against each other to test their knowledge of subjects such as art, economics, language and literature, mathematics, music, social science and science. The winner of the competition will represent Merced County at the state level in March.

Students compete in delivering prepared essays, impromptu speeches, oral interviews and a super quiz, a relay session that has teams answer questions on the spot.

Each year since 2008, Merced High has taken home the top prize at the county level, allowing its team to compete in Division 3 at the state competition, with students typically earning medals there.

Joel Sebastian, Merced High’s coach, has led the team to each victory.

It’s hard to predict how the team will do each year, Sebastian said, since there’s just one competition.

“Every year people ask, ‘How do you think you’ll do? Do you think you have a strong team?’ ” he said. “What’s interesting about decathlon is that you don’t know until the competition. It’s not like sports where you play at the county level and then have playoffs. We’re at playoffs right away.”

Sebastian began coaching the team around 2000, just a few years after he began teaching U.S. history at the school. Now, he’s an academic coach at Merced High and works with students in an interdisciplinary studies class that typically studies the Academic Decathlon curriculum.

An important aspect to the Bears’ success, Sebastian said, is finding the right mix of students for the eight- or nine-person team.

In recent years, the top-scoring student at the county level has been from Merced, he said. It’s also important to have a “varsity,” or B team, that has been exposed to tough curricula, such as the ones in Advanced Placement classes.

“We have a great group of core teachers on this campus,” Sebastian said, “So when a student gets a gold medal in math, I have to give credit to the other teachers.”

It’s also important to choose students who have skills beyond high test scores, since they also give speeches and are interviewed.

“I look for students who communicate well and those who have strong personalities,” Sebastian said. “It’s not just about having high test scores.”

Returning team members also have the advantage of competing at the state level and knowing what it takes to be competitive at the higher level.

This year, the Merced team is composed of eight seniors and one junior who is competing for the third time. The returning junior, John Richey, received two silver and one bronze medals in last year’s county competition.

The public is invited to attend the super quiz portion of the decathlon at 3 p.m. Saturday in the Merced College gymnasium. The awards ceremony will be held in the Merced College Theater, 3600 M St., at 7 p.m.

This story was originally published February 5, 2016 at 6:33 PM with the headline "Bears plan to defend Academic Decathlon championship."